topological closeness....

Wed May 15 20:57:46 UTC 1996

Paul,

You can be a vocal as you desire, but ultimately from this part of the
globe the dominant factor in any ISP business is the cost of the
International Private Lease. This lease cost is approximately 10 times
the cost of domestic infrastructure.

Now when you construct an IPL in a competitive environment where do
you terminate it? Generally you are loking for an optimal mix of price
and functionality. The observation for the AP region today is that the
cheapest IPL half circuits for the AP region terminate in the
US. Hence Randy's observation. The internal infrastructure within the
AP region happens in a second pass, once the primary objective of
major connectivity is achieved internal infrastructure can be cost
effective if there is internal traffic flow to match.

About the only thing that could hasten regional infrastructure is a
drastic revision of the trading practices and expectation of return on
investment by the undersea cable investors. Exchange points have
little impact per se as they are, in economic terms, a minor aspect of
the entire equation.

Thanks,

    Geoff

> 
> At 07:37 PM 5/15/96 +0900, David R. Conrad wrote:
> 
> >
> >In the Asia Pacific Rim region, nearly all the bandwidth goes from AP
> >region countries to the US directly.  This is true due to the
> >tariffing situation, although it is now beginning to change (some
> >intra-Asia networks have already been established).
> >
> 
> I think many of us have been *very* vocal supporters of encouraging
> creationm of multiple AP NAPs to avoid this form of dementia.  :-)
> 
> When traffic transits back to the US West Coast to reach another AP
> location, this clearly contributes to the overall problem.
> 
> >Putting mirrors in countries usually makes sense (particularly when a
> >country has an Internet exchange or two), but putting them on a
> >continental basis generally doesn't.
> >
> 
> Agreed. Creating exchange points would also help immensely.
> 
> - paul
> 
> 
> 